Bringing home owners and house sitters together
Sitter available
Hands-on reliable couple with IT, home care, DIY and garden skills
France
Testimonials
They have 6 testimonials (view below)
Pet experience
Dog(s), Cat(s), Chicken(s), Bird(s), Fish – Dealt with emergency medical issues for one of the pets and attacks between dogs.
Police check
They don't have a police check
Availability
From: 31 Dec 2022
Until: 31 Dec 2027
(see their busy times below)
Occupation
Lifestyle consultant and virtual administrator
References
They have referees/references (view below)
About this sitter
Keith and Marijke are a couple around 60 originally from the UK and The Netherlands. After living 5 years in the UK and 25 years in Australia we have moved to France and bought a house in Limoux. We like to create a lifestyle where we combine working online with living in Limoux and housesitting in a variety of countries.
Why they want to house sit
We are house owners ourselves and we care about properties and their gardens. We understand that it can be hard to leave a house unattended for a period of time when home owners like to travel themselves. House sitting to us is a perfect win win situation where a home owner has peace of mind when leaving the property and the house sitter gets the opportunity to experience a variety of houses and can explore new locations. Also due to our preferred lifestyle we do not have pets ourselves, but we do love them. Housesitting is the perfect to get to care for other people's pets.
Their experience
We have looked after houses and gardens with dogs, cats and chickens in Australia (2), The Netherlands (1), Spain (2) and France (6). Marijke has maintained a large garden in Brisbane while the Australian owners were on a sabbatical in France for 6 months. We have experience with homes with more than one dog - in fact two of our housesits had four dogs.
We have external references available if requested. Not all our housesits have been organised via Mind My House. Most of the housesits we have done were either via word of mouth or we were directly approached through this site. We have done a couple of repeat house sits.
What can they bring to the assignment
We are a hands-on couple with extensive garden (vegetable garden in training) and computer skills and we have looked after homes with up to 4 dogs, two cats and chickens. Some of the dogs were very strong and large. Also we have experience in receiving paying guests and making them feel comfortable. Marijke has advanced hospitality skills and client contact in various countries including France, UK, Switzerland, Australia and The Netherlands.
We have done house sits where we had to deal with severe storms, flooding in the house, mould and rot in vegetable gardens due to excessive rains and a pet that needed urgent medical attention. We have always made sure we did what was needed and mediated with the owners in the best possible way.
In sum, if you have specific requests for your house sit, have a chat to us. We might well have the experience!
Last updated:
1 Sep 2024
Available to house sit
Belgium, France, Germany, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland
Availability dates
From: 31 Dec 2022
Until: 31 Dec 2027
They have indicated that they are busy at the following times:
16 December 2022 to 4 March 2023, 16 April 2023 to 10 May 2023
Do they charge?
They don't charge for house sitting services
Personal details
Age: 56-65 years old
Family status:
Couple
Membership
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References
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Sitemap
MindMyHouse.com – https://www.mindmyhouse.com/owners/sitter_listing/34784
Testimonials
YES!! A very reliable, caring and trustworthy couple!
Marijke & Keith came to look after our two cats for 3 and a half weeks. Due to our travel schedules, we didn't meet in person but that wasn't an issue. The communication with them was very easy and clear! Upon our return, it was so nice to find the house in a better state than we left it! Keith has fixed a few things around the house (thank you so much!) and they have taken care of all the plants and the garden. Our cats were calm and well taken care of!! We received updates and pictures and throughout our vacation, I was able to relax and not worry about how things were going on back home! I can highly recommend Marijke & Keith if you need reliable, responsible, and caring people to take charge of your home and look after your pets. I will be reaching out to them myself for our next vacation!
Eliza, Netherlands, 29 Aug 2024
Caring and Professional Petsitters
Keith and Marijke sat for us in September 2023 for just over 2 weeks. They arrived a day early as requested and settled in right away. Attentive to all the information and asking pertinent questions we got along very well. We enjoyed a meal and evening together. During our holiday we were kept up to date with any issues ( they didn’t have hot water in one area of the house unexpectedly) and they adapted well to this problem. We were happy that our pets and house were being well looked after. On our return everything was fine and just as we’d left it and our animals had obviously been given 5 star treatment! We would not hesitate to recommend them for future sits and look forward to seeing them again.
Sue, France, 1 Oct 2023
A challenging time in France
It proved a challenging time for Marijke and Kieth whilst minding our house. Our veg garden is the most important aspect of the sit which this year was drowned by rain and afflicted by the subsequent mould. They contacted our friends in the village and obtained advice from them plus they kept in touch with us for advice etc. After the sit the weather improved as did the garden. Upon our return it was apparent that they weren’t used to cultivating a vegetable plot but in fact they did a good job and learned a few things for future house sits.The house was immaculate and Marijke left us some chutneys which she had made using the veg from the garden. So thanks for looking after things.
Patricia, France, 28 Sep 2021
Great Housesitters
Marijke and Keith looked after La Bourdette really well for us over the two weeks and were very professional in their dealings with regard to visitors to the property. They were always available quickly if needed for communication and were totally reliable. They are a lovely, cheerful and hard-working couple who left the house in immaculate order. We have absolutely no hesitation in recommending them as house-sitters!
David, France, 26 Jul 2021
Great Sitters for our 2 dogs and 2 cats
Marijke and Keith were great sitters for my two dogs (one large & one high energy medium sized) and two cats - they followed our guide and if they weren't sure of something they asked first - a really good quality. Their sit from Nov 2020 was during the various lockdowns in the UK and Spain and they were very flexible and accommodating with our dates changes when flights got cancelled and rescheduled. In the end they kindly extended their stay until February and even arranged for handover to new sitters as we were still stuck in the UK. They were sensible, caring and great up front communicators in addition to taking good care of our brood of animals. They'd be welcome back any time.
GInnie, Spain, 4 Mar 2021
Excellent, reliable, house and animal sitters
Marijka and Keith are excellent house sitters. They have done two sessions for us, 2 weeks and 5 weeks, and we have booked them again for 6 weeks next Spring. They are a reliable, well organised, clean and tidy couple. Our dogs and cats are well cared for and look healthy on our return. All our plants were thriving too. They adapted very well to off-grid living and coped well with difficult circumstances like the floods we had on both their October visits.
Simon, Spain, 2 Dec 2019